'89. and these towers loomed over the Century of Progress in much the same way. The steel-web frameworks rose over six hundred feet, higher than any of Chicago's skyscrapers, the tallest towers this side of the Atlantic coast. A third of the way up, the silver, red-striped 'rocket' cars, carrying thirty or fort)' passengers, crossed the lagoon on overhanging cable tracks. Last week, when we'd taken that trip, I felt we were up plenty high enough; now, as we entered the pennant-flapping SKY RIDE entryway, getting into one of the two elevators that went to the top (two others went to the rocket-car platform), we'd be going up another four hundred feet, to the observation deck.
It took a whole minute to get there, and we looked first from the windows of the enclosed observation room, the fair spread out before us like a colorful electric map. One of the fair's pith-helmeted security' guards was on- duty in the observation room; not too many people up here tonight- maybe a dozen, mostly couples. I said hello to the guard, a florid-faced guy of about forty who used to be a traffic cop; he said hello back, and whispered he'd got a pickpocket earlier that day, seeming proud of himself. I patted him on the arm and told him atta boy.
Mary Ann was still looking out the window, breathless; she loved looking down on the lights of the fair and, beyond that, of the city. But I was ready to go, and said so.
'Oh, Nathan! We haven't even been up on the observation deck.'
'This is as far as I go.'
She hugged one of my amis with both of hers. 'Don't be a wet blanket. It's a beautiful night; there'll be a nice breeze.'
'Freeze our butts off. is more like it,' I said, but then we were walking the final flight up. and Mary Ann dragged me to the highest exhibit at the fair- the Otis Elevator exhibit, which showed the machinery that operated the Sky Ride's high-speed elevators- also the dullest exhibit. I might add- which was in a building that covered all but the outer walkway area of the unenclosed observation deck.
Outside, on the deck, there weren't many people; the wind was blowing a bit too much for standing on top of a tower six-hundred-some feet off the ground. We found a place around one side of the building, where the deck jutted out like a porch so you could get a better look at the fair, and stood by the rail, having a gander, enjoying some privacy.
And seeing the fair stretched out before you, not through a window, but right before you, leaning against a rail and looking out at it, well, dammit if it didn't take
I turned to Mary Ann to comment on this, to leave cynicism behind for a moment and be frankly impressed with all this, and Mary Ann's eyes were wide and she was intaking breath, and not because of the view.
Somebody was coming up behind me.
Fast.
The outstretched hands hit me just as I was turning, my right hand reaching toward the automatic under my coat, but not quite getting there, and it was a guy in a straw hat and pale yellow suit and just as I was going over the rail, backward. I saw Mary Ann slapping at him with both hands and his hat flew off. got caught by the breeze and went flapping by me as I fell, and I recognized him. and the sole thought in my panic-stricken brain was.
I hit a steel support beam, hard, on my back, and it knocked the wind out of me, but somehow my mind or instinct or some goddamn thing overrode, and I grabbed at the beam, catching it in the crook of one ami, and I clung to it, hugged it, wrapped both amis, both legs around it. The support connected the platform to the tower structure at a 45-degree angle, and thank God I hadn't got to my gun, because I needed both hands. The support was about as big around as a man's leg, and had rough sharp edges all 'round, digging into my flesh as I hung there in the breeze, my tie, my suit, flapping.
I was on the underside of the beam, like some animal clinging to a tree limb. I didn't look down; I knew what was down there- my fucking stomach, for one thing.
So I looked up, back up, toward where I'd fallen from, and Mary Ann was leaning over the side, reaching her hand out to me, but she was far away, ten feet, ten miles, ten years, and the guy was behind her. and I had to swallow before I could yell, 'Look out!'
And she was struggling with him, he had her halfway over the side, and I let go with one arm, clutching with the other, legs hooked 'round the slanted support, and got my automatic out from under my arm.
Christ knows how. and the guy just about had her over the side when he saw the eye of my automatic looking at him, and. before I could fire it at him, he disappeared from view.
Mary Ann, thankfully, did not; the blond gone, she leaned over and reached out again and I said, 'No! Too far!' and she began to cry. I think she was trying to scream, but couldn't find the sound. Or maybe she
I yelled at her: 'Go down to the observation booth!'
She nodded, and disappeared.
The support I called home angled under the platform, connecting underneath it; I'd fallen past the windows of the observation booth, but apparently nobody had seen me, and I was at a position that prevented them from noticing me, hanging here like Harold Lloyd. The support below me paralleled this one but connected right to the corner under the observation booth and its windows. If I could drop down to the next support, I might crawl up it and get in view of the people in the booth, besides which Mary Ann would by now have alerted them to my situation anyway, and I might with somebody's help make it in through a window.
It was only about five feet down; I wouldn't have to be an acrobat to make it. But it would have helped.
I tried not to look at the fair below me. I tried not to think about the six-hundred-foot drop below me. Just that support beam five feet down.
